Radio resource allocation is required in D2D communications both for discovery and communication purposes. In order to be able to establish and maintain reliable D2D communications, radio resources, e.g. in terms of physical resource blocks (PRBs) assigned to the devices participating in the communication, must be allocated taking into account possible surrounding interferences.
For example, in 4G, an evolved nodeB (sometimes abbreviated as “eNodeB” or “eNB”) is responsible for all of the communications in a cell and, therefore, is in charge of the radio resource allocation within the cell. Typically it can be assumed that an eNB can distribute the uplink (UL) resources within a cell in non-overlapping manner. In other words, the eNB can distribute the resources in such a manner that there is no risk of interference between D2D and conventional cellular UL transmissions as well as between different D2D transmissions within that cell.
However, D2D communications between the devices of a particular eNB may still experience interference caused by devices, including pairs or groups of devices, engaged in radio communications covered by different eNBs or by devices not covered by any eNBs. Thus, interferences to a pair of devices in a D2D communication can originate from other devices engaged in radio communications, irrespective of whether or not they are within the coverage of, and/or attached to, the telecommunications network.
What is needed in the art is a technique for allocating radio resources that can improve or eliminate at least some of these drawbacks.